Need For Speed crashes and burns

Overly serious, overcomplicated, and underwhelming

The very first trailer for Need For Speed set off every alarm bell. And after seeing the movie last week, it was clear: Act of Valor director Scott Waugh's stunt-driven car-guy adventure film lives down to all the expectations. Sure, there are cool rides and genuinely eye-popping stunts, but it's all wasted in the service of a predictable yet absurdly complicated story that takes itself far too seriously.

Tobey Marshall (Aaron Paul) is a down-on-his-luck mechanic and street racer who stands to lose his Mt. Kisco, NY garage unless he can pay the bank in short order. Opportunity knocks in the form of Dino Brewster (Dominic Cooper), Tobey's former rival who not only became a pro racer, but also stole Tobey's ex-girlfriend. He has a big-money job for Tobey and his crew: complete an unfinished project Mustang that was started by Ford and Carroll Shelby but stalled after the chicken farmer's death and somehow "vanished." (Because in this alternate universe, Shelby American, a company that unabashedly charges $15K for a bolt-ons-and-dress-up package for the Ford Focus ST, lets the mythical Priceless Last Carroll Shelby Project Ever just disappear.)

They complete the car, which is unveiled at a private event in NYC. There we meet Julia Maddon (Imogen Poots), whose job is to demonstrate that pretty girls can recite the contents of the Ford Racing Performance Parts catalog with a British accent. She's inspecting the car for a more-money-than-sense client who buys it for almost $3 million after Tobey, against Dino's wishes, gets behind the wheel and proves that it can go over 230 mph. (He somehow manages this on a road course.)

Day saved! Tobey and his crew get a generous cut of the sale and live happily ever after. Well, that's what would have happened if the characters in the film weren't genetically predisposed to make the worst possible decisions at every given opportunity.

So, when the ego-bruised (for no good reason) Dino challenges Tobey to a race in his uncle's unregistered Koenigsegg Ageras for his cut of the Mustang sale, he agrees. Conveniently, there are three Ageras available, so Tobey's friend, sidekick, and ex-girlfriend's kid brother, "Little Pete" (Harrison Gilbertson), talks his way into the race as well.

What ensues is by far the best set piece of the film—a spectacular wreck that claims Little Pete's life and sets up the rest of the film's byzantine plot. Tobey goes to prison, framed for the accident by Dino, who returns to his life of leisure and gratuitous douchebaggery.

When Tobey gets sprung, he wants to clear his name and also (NEW PLOT POINT!) drive in the De Leon, an invite-only underground street race organized by the nebulous and entirely superfluous "Monarch" (Michael Keaton), a racing impresario/DJ whose radio show is a writer's device designed to guide the hapless audience through the remainder of the progressively idiotic storyline.

Tobey miraculously talks the Super Duper Mustang's owner into loaning him the car for the race. Julia (Poots) is sent along to babysit, and the pair streak cross-country in a race against time, the police, Dino's henchmen, and the audience's suspension of disbelief. Their goal? Make it to San Francisco for the De Leon's start and deliver Dino (who's racing in it, natch) his final comeuppance.

If it sounds like way too much is going on, it's because there is. This is compounded by a more serious problem: the characters are either unlikeable, one-dimensional, unnecessary, or a combination thereof. Aaron Paul is so much better than the material he had to work with here, but despite his efforts to find his inner Steve McQueen, you're never given a compelling reason to relate to Tobey. When he's not tortured and making his slow-burn face, he's making the stupid choices that put him in this mess to begin with. I'm supposed to care what happens to that guy? Hell. I don't even like that guy.

Hence, after the (anti)climactic showdown, there's no satisfaction, save for a sense of relief once the credits start rolling. For all the action, fast cars, wild stunts, and little car-guy Easter Eggs thrown in along the way (Bullitt! A Bandit Trans Am! Big Oly!), there's a distinct lack of fun in Need For Speed. Even the scenes intended to serve as comic relief just slow down the plodding narrative.

And that's why you're better served sitting home and watching all six Fast and Furious films this weekend instead of paying to see NFS. For all the trash people talk about them, those films just work. They're entirely self-aware, they don't take themselves too seriously, and the overwhelming feeling is that everyone involved is having a blast—it radiates off the screen. As a viewer, you become invested.

That's why you can smile and gleefully accept the notion of Dodge Chargers dragging a bank vault through the streets of Rio de Janiero in Fast Five, yet find yourself checking your watch impatiently as a parade of exotics gets smashed to bits in Need For Speed's final act.

There's a great stunt midway through the film in which a helicopter swoops down and literally yanks Aaron Paul and his Mustang out of a hopeless situation at the last second. Unfortunately, there's no one to fly in and save the charmless Need For Speed from itself.